• Competitor rules

    Please remember that any mention of competitors, hinting at competitors or offering to provide details of competitors will result in an account suspension. The full rules can be found under the 'Terms and Rules' link in the bottom right corner of your screen. Just don't mention competitors in any way, shape or form and you'll be OK.

Quick answer please.

I can't run ultra with my current cards.

That's down to nothing more than vram limitations. I assume you are running a 2gb 5970 which gives you 1gb of vram total to play with.

Which is no longer enough for titles such as BF3 and NFSTR on ultra as they have huge textures.

Personally? I would sell. Reason I would sell is because I watched a Sapphire 5970 2gb sell for £220 just two days ago. A 5870 commands around £90-£100 so he is offering you well over the going rate second hand.

Whatever you decide to go with next just make sure you have at least 2gb vram. On a single card, 2gb vram. If you want to SLI (you seem to like multiple GPUs so fair play) make sure both cards have at least 2gb vram.

Your single card options are very limited. You're looking at either a 3gb 580 or a 3gb 7970. Both are around the same price, the 580 being a yesteryear card with a urine extracting price tag.
 
Thanks a bunch to all of you for the very informative information.

The chap is picking the cards up soon.

I quite fancy the 7970 to begin with then I may stick another one in later in the year, if needs be.

I only ever play BF3 at 1080p. So I can't see any problems at that rez. Would like to run Ultra textures though. My old cards had 1gb of Vram so it was impossible without the HDD thrashing.

Free upgrade to a 7970 can't be a bad move really.
 
Thanks a bunch to all of you for the very informative information.

The chap is picking the cards up soon.

I quite fancy the 7970 to begin with then I may stick another one in later in the year, if needs be.

I only ever play BF3 at 1080p. So I can't see any problems at that rez. Would like to run Ultra textures though. My old cards had 1gb of Vram so it was impossible without the HDD thrashing.

Free upgrade to a 7970 can't be a bad move really.
Nice one, don't forget post what happens and how happy you've become :cool:
 
I play mainly BF3 at 1080, with all settings on ultra I get 60fps with no drops with vsync on, between 62 and 114 with it off (88 avg fps) with a mild overclock under CCC.

Cheers mate sounds great.

Nice one, don't forget post what happens and how happy you've become :cool:

Of course I will. First upgrade in over 2 years, bit excited really....:D

Only thing is my Coolermaster Cosmos case is going to look a bit empty, boy did those cards take up a lot of room. :)
 
Last edited:
Went from same setup as op, got myself a XFX Black 7970 to play BF3 at 2560x1440, maxed all setting just no msaa 60 fps but still wanted more, so got myself another 7970 today. All maxed out at 60 fps very happy. V sync off upto 75 fps. Bloody expensive way to play a game but sold all my old cards to get another so cannot complain.
 
Went from same setup as op, got myself a XFX Black 7970 to play BF3 at 2560x1440, maxed all setting just no msaa 60 fps but still wanted more, so got myself another 7970 today. All maxed out at 60 fps very happy. V sync off upto 75 fps. Bloody expensive way to play a game but sold all my old cards to get another so cannot complain.

You could probably OC the vram a little and have the MSAA at x4
 
Really? Buy old tech Nvidia cards when new ones are just around the corner and the current AMD offerings are better? Strange advice. :confused:
I would sell and get a 7970 or, if you can wait for Kepler, wait and see what fits your requirements best when they come out.
Of course nobody can give a date that Kepler is due out so you could end up waiting a while.

When there's nothing wrong with the older generation cards paying twice the price for the newest offering with barely noticeable improvements doesn't make much sense to me.. Last year I bought 2 480's from OCuk for less than £400. I'm quite confident that these will last me a while yet. The only major advantage I can see is having more VRAM but as the OP is gaming at 1920x1080 this shouldn't be a problem. Power consumption will obviously be lower but meh.. nothing wrong with the older gen Nvidia's
 
Last edited:
When there's nothing wrong with the older generation cards paying twice the price for the newest offering with barely noticeable improvements doesn't make much sense to me..

That would make perfect sense if it were true. However, given that the 3gb GTX 580 costs the same as a 7970 and has been around for about a year it doesn't make sense. At all.

Last year I bought 2 480's from OCuk for less than £400. I'm quite confident that these will last me a while yet. The only major advantage I can see is having more VRAM but as the OP is gaming at 1920x1080 this shouldn't be a problem. Power consumption will obviously be lower but meh.. nothing wrong with the older gen Nvidia's

They're great cards. Sadly Nvidia have not dropped the prices on their high end 5 series cards so they are not good value, at all. Let alone half price.
 
That would make perfect sense if it were true. However, given that the 3gb GTX 580 costs the same as a 7970 and has been around for about a year it doesn't make sense. At all.

They're great cards. Sadly Nvidia have not dropped the prices on their high end 5 series cards so they are not good value, at all. Let alone half price.

I wasn't considering a 3gb GTX 580 as a old gen hardware since older cards don't have 3gb.

I put mine under water and for price/performance I'm incredibly happy :)
 
I'd buy a Saphire 7950 OC, personally I find the quietness of my 5870 Vapor-X worth every penny and I think the same applies to that card.

If you can wait you'll probably save a bit, but probably not loads in the grand scheme of things.
 
Back
Top Bottom